A comment frequently heard about iPad apps is how they are more polished than similar Android apps. I have made the same observation as I use both platforms regularly. A lot of that polish has to do with iPad developers using a more consistent interface design than the helter-skelter approach often used on the Android side.

I regularly use an iPad 2 and a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 running Ice Cream Sandwich (custom ROM), and have a stable of regular apps I use heavily. The best way to show how the two platforms compare with app design is to display them side-by-side, and that's what you'll find in the following gallery.

Four of the ten apps compared have versions on both platforms, so the comparison is a direct one in design by the same developers. It is a bit odd why developers would release the same app on each platform with a different design. The other six apps compared are similar in function with its compared app, and paint a good picture of the differences in both functionality and design.

James Kendrick has been using mobile devices since they weighed 30 pounds, and has been sharing his insights on mobile technology for almost that long. Prior to joining ZDNet, James was the Founding Editor of jkOnTheRun, a CNET Top 100 Tech Blog that was acquired by GigaOM in 2008 and is now part of that prestigious tech network. James' w...
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